From: trudie.Miller@cox.net   
      
   January 12th - Saint Aelred or Alfred, Abbot   
   (1109-1167)   
      
   Saint Aelred was renowned in the court of a royal Saint, David of Scotland,   
   for his humility and his gentleness. He resolved to separate from his king,   
   his friends, and all whom he loved dearly, reflecting that death will soon   
   separate us from all things in this world. To make his sacrifice complete,   
   he left Scotland and went to the Province of York in England, where he   
   received the habit at the age of twenty-four years under William, Abbot of   
   Rieval, a disciple of Saint Bernard.   
      
   The heart of Saint Aelred never ceased to love his friends, according to his   
   own avowal, because the center of it was Love itself. He was heard to   
   exclaim: "What is love, O my God? It is, if I am not mistaken, this   
   ineffable delight of the soul, the more sweet as it is more pure, the more   
   gratifying as it is more ardent. The one who loves You possesses You in   
   proportion to his love, because You are Love. Love is the torrent of joy   
   with which you inebriate Your elect, transforming them into Yourself by love   
   for You!"   
      
   As a young monk, his attention was drawn to one of his brethren because of   
   his holiness. This good monk, named Simon, had left the world in his youth,   
   and he appeared as though deaf and dumb, so absorbed was he in God. One day   
   Aelred, forgetting for a moment the rule of perpetual silence, spoke to him.   
   At once he prostrated himself at his feet, acknowledging his fault; but   
   Simon's look of pain haunted him for many a year, and taught him to let no   
   human sentiment disturb for one moment his or another's union with God.   
      
   Aelred in 1142 was named Abbot of Revesby, a newly founded Cistercian   
   monastery, and the following year was obliged to take upon himself the   
   government of the larger monastery of Rieval. A novice once came to him,   
   saying that he must return to the world. But Aelred had begged his soul of   
   God and answered, "Brother, do not ruin yourself; nevertheless you will be   
   unable to do so, despite your desire." The novice would not listen, however,   
   and wandered among the hills, thinking all the while he was going far from   
   the abbey. At sunset he found himself before a convent strangely like   
   Rieval, and Rieval it was. The first monk he met was Aelred, who embraced   
   him, saying, "Son, why have you done this? I have wept for you with many   
   tears, and I trust in God that, as I have asked of Him, you will not   
   perish." The world does not so dearly love its friends.   
      
   At the command of his superiors Aelred composed his great works, both   
   historical and ascetic, among which are the Life of David, King of Scotland;   
   Life of Saint Margaret, Queen of Scotland; Spiritual Friendship and Mirror   
   of Charity. In the last-named treatise he says that true love of God is only   
   to be obtained by joining ourselves in all things to the Passion of Christ.   
   Saint Aelred died in 1167, Superior of some three hundred monks.   
      
   Reflection. When a soul has given itself to God, God gives back friendship,   
   with all His other gifts, a hundredfold multiplied. Friends are then loved   
   no longer for themselves only, but for God, and with a love lively and   
   tender, for God can easily purify sentiment. It is not sentiment but   
   self-love which corrupts friendship.   
      
   Sources: Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a compilation based on   
   Butler's Lives of the Saints and other sources by John Gilmary Shea   
   (Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894); Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des   
   Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guérin (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 1.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   We must try to keep the mind in tranquility. For just as the eye which   
   constantly shifts its gaze, now turning to the right or to the left, now   
   incessantly peering up or down, cannot see distinctly what lies before it,   
   but the sight must be fixed firmly on the object in view if one would make   
   his vision of it clear; so too man's mind when distracted by his countless   
   worldly cares cannot focus itself distinctly on the truth.   
   -St. Basil the Great   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   Fight the good fight of faith.  Lay hold on eternal life,   
   whereunto thou art called and be it confessed a good confession before   
   many witnesses. I charge thee before God who quickeneth all things, and   
   before   
   Christ Jesus who gave testimony under Pontius Pilate, a good   
   confession:  (1 Tim. 6:12-13)   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   ANGEL'S PRAYER   
   (Given to the three children by the Angel who   
   preceded Our Lady's first appearance to them.)   
      
   MOST Holy Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, I adore Thee profoundly.   
   I offer Thee the Most Precious Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity   
   of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles of the world,   
   in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges, and indifference   
   by which He is offended.  And through the infinite merit   
   of His Most Sacred Heart, and the Immaculate Heart of Mary,   
   I beg of Thee the conversion of poor sinners.   
   (3 times)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)